Pill crushing is common in nursing homes, hospitals, and other types of long-term care facilities, and is performed by the medical staff. In the home, pills are often crushed by family members or by healthcare aides. Crushing is performed in a variety of locations and various devices are used. Some of the known devices and methods include using a Mortar and Pestle, a hammer, a razor, or an inverted spoon technique, all of which require manually pressing pills into a powdered form. A problem with manually crushing pills is that it requires physical strength and some techniques are unsafe, such as using a hammer or razor blade. Further, manually crushing several pills a day can cause repetitive motion injuries, such as carpal tunnel syndrome. Another problem is that it is difficult to recover the entire medication dosage since the pill is not contained when crushed.
Others have addressed the problem of crushing pills manually. U.S. Pat. No. 6,622,949 (Baswick et al.) discloses a portable pill crusher having a solenoid and cup assembly. A problem with this invention is that the solenoid produces a startling, loud bang when crushing pills. Further, there is no biasing spring to force the cups in an upward direction after crushing. Another problem with this design is that it does not have a pulverizing attachment to prevent the pills from being re-compacted by the force of the ram head. What is needed then is a device for allowing one to crush pills more safely and easily, while still recovering the full dose in a powdered form.